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Consumer Products => Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security (legacy Pro Antivirus, Internet Security, Premier) => Topic started by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 01:32:04 PM

Title: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 01:32:04 PM
Ok, I've seen at avast site that there was an attempt to solve this problem at the 4.7.623 version. Ok... I installed avast 4.6.763 last week and everything was fine until 2 days ago, when the system becomes incredible slow to perform the shutdown (the "Windows is shutting down" screen in Windows XP home edition)... it started taking about 3 to 5 minutes to shutdown.

Well, after a lot of tests with some of the programs that were installed in my computer, I found that when I kill the ashserv.exe process, the system get back to normal shutdown delay.

Is there anything I'm missing? Is there anything I can do to solve this problem?

Juliano/Brazil
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slow windows xp shutdown process
Post by: essexboy on March 05, 2006, 01:37:02 PM
I have experienced no problems with this build.  However, I have experienced the same problem with ZA pro so what I do is shut down ZA before I shutdown windows.  Do you use ZA?  Also if it initialy worked with no problem I would assume that some other element is causing your slowdown, or am I misreading your post ?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slow windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 01:44:03 PM
essexboy,

Before I try kill any avast process, I've tried kill zonealarm, and it didn't sove the slow shutdown problem. Thank you anyway. I'm listening for more sugestions...
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slow windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Lisandro on March 05, 2006, 02:40:08 PM
Before I try kill any avast process, I've tried kill zonealarm
No troubles at shutdown here... I'm using ZA either... Which version are you using? I think there was an update recently...
Did you try to uninstall (and not only disable) ZA?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slow windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 03:41:50 PM
Tech,

I've just update my Zone Alarm, but it seems it had no effect at all. The shutting down problem persists... I also tried shutting down msn, as I had configured it to use Avast to check for incoming files viruses (Tools->Options->File Transfers).

Acctually, the only thing I do that seems to work fine is kill the ashserv.exe process.

I'm still listening for new things to tryout.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: igor on March 05, 2006, 04:06:55 PM
Does the avast! icon spin during the slow shutdown (if it's still visible)?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slow windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Lisandro on March 05, 2006, 04:14:01 PM
Acctually, the only thing I do that seems to work fine is kill the ashserv.exe process.
If just before shuting down you left click the 'a' blue icon and let the Standard Shield properties being shown, can you see the 'last' scanned file there?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 04:15:53 PM
Igor, when I begin shutting down, yes, it spins. But I can't see it during all the shutdown process... after a while, windows does a logoff and starts the shutting down routine... it passes to the "saving user's preferences" (or something like that) screen and then it stays a lot of time in the next message screen ("windows is shutting down")... during this message, at first, some disk access is performed, but only in the very begining. After this very begining period, comes a looooong period where no disk access is performed and the shutting down process seems it won't finish anymore. After a few minutes (about 4 or 5 minutes) the shuttdown process finish successfully.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Lisandro on March 05, 2006, 06:32:46 PM
Jpavel, can you go Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Events
And check in each category if there is an ERROR while saving the user registry while shutting down or something similar?
Ist there any other error that could be interesting to know and troubleshoot?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 07:10:45 PM
Tech,

  There was no Errors, but there was a warning at the Application branch that may be related to the problem. It it's in Portuguese because is my default langage, but I'm gonna translate it:

"Windos has saved JOEY\Juliano Pável's User Registry Entry while an aplication or service still was using the Registry during logoff. The memory used by the user's Registry hasn't been released. The Registry will be flushed when it's not in use anymore.

Often this is caused by services that are being executed as an user account. Try setting them to run in the LocalService or NetworkService account."

(Same warning in Portuguese: "O Windows salvou o Registro JOEY\Juliano Pável do usuário enquanto um aplicativo ou serviço ainda estava usando o Registro durante o logoff. A memória usada pelo Registro do usuário não foi liberada. O Registro será descarregado quando não estiver mais em uso.

 Em geral, isso é causado por serviços que estão sendo executados como uma conta de usuário. Tente configurá-los para que sejam executados na conta LocalService ou NetworkService.")

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Lisandro on March 05, 2006, 07:19:36 PM
"O Windows salvou o Registro JOEY\Juliano Pável do usuário enquanto um aplicativo ou serviço ainda estava usando o Registro durante o logoff. A memória usada pelo Registro do usuário não foi liberada. O Registro será descarregado quando não estiver mais em uso. Em geral, isso é causado por serviços que estão sendo executados como uma conta de usuário. Tente configurá-los para que sejam executados na conta LocalService ou NetworkService."
This is the problem... but what is causing this is unknown for me.
I'll think and post later...
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: MrRAlan on March 05, 2006, 11:13:51 PM
Do you have the avast and VRDB system tray icons merged?  If so, this causes a long delay in the shutdown process most of the time.  This has been mentioned before but apparently avast cannot find a fix for it.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 05, 2006, 11:24:27 PM
Thank you, MrRAlan! It seems the problem is solved. I've split up the icons into VRDB and avast again and the shutdown becomes normal in the first test I've just made. If something strange happen again, I'll report it here.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: CharleyO on March 05, 2006, 11:39:00 PM
***

Thank you for posting help, MrRAlan.    :)

Welcome to the forums, jpavel.    :)

I am sure we are all happy that your problem is solved.

Please come back often, learn more, and maybe help others.    :)


***
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Vlk on March 06, 2006, 10:52:58 PM
MrRAlan, that sort of surprises me. Your saying this is a KNOWN problem and a KNOWN workaround (to split the icons)? I hear something like that for the first time...

Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: MrRAlan on March 06, 2006, 11:57:52 PM
Hi Vlk,

I just say that because I read previous posts here about this problem.  This is where I first learned of it.  Splitting the icons works for me also but I don't want two icons.  The question is, will avast look into this to see if they make it shutdown properly when the two icons are merged???  Thanks Vlk.

Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Lisandro on March 07, 2006, 12:29:21 AM
Do you have the avast and VRDB system tray icons merged?  If so, this causes a long delay in the shutdown process most of the time.  This has been mentioned before but apparently avast cannot find a fix for it.
Alan, for sure this is not truth... at least, merged icons NEVER slowdown my system, my shutdown, etc.
I can't even see any relationship between the two facts... Maybe you can post more info to discuss this. Thanks.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: MrRAlan on March 07, 2006, 02:32:41 AM
I cannot explain it but it solved the problem with several users.  It works for me and it worked for the original poster of this thread!  I didn't make it up, I read it here before from another user.  I don't know where the posts are but search and you will find them.  When avast merges the icons, there must be something else happening in the code that is causing it.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 07, 2006, 03:21:37 AM
Vlk, MrALan is right.... I looked for it yesterday in the forum and found it. But, unfortunately, the problem didn't go away a hundred percent as I first thought and post a few days ago. Now it comes back intermitently. Sometimes it happens, and sometimes it doesn't. It happens more than it doesn't.

By the way, I'm gonna change the ok icon on the thread of this message. And I'm considering uninstalling avast, because what is happing with my system is very annoying

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: CharleyO on March 07, 2006, 04:26:23 AM
***

After reading this thread a couple of days ago, I decided to test this. I split the tray icons, did a shutdown, restarted, merged the icons again, shutdown, and finally restarted again. I did this several times over 48 hours under various curcumstances ... programs/IE windows left running, programs/IE windows closed first, etc. These were complete shutdowns and not a restart from the shutdown menu. Honestly, I could not tell any difference in shutdown times.

Perhaps this happens on some systems depending on the hardware/system settings/software involved.    ???


***
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 07, 2006, 12:43:51 PM
CharleyO, I agree with you... there is a bug that show it self depending on the user settings... in my case, I really don't remember what changes I did after installing avast. It's important to say that it worked fine in the first days.

Anyway, for now I decided to uninstall the product until this bug is solved. My windows is shutting down normaly again and I'm using AVG for a while. If anyone have a clue about what is the problem for sure, please, tell me, and I'll be glad to reinstall and test it here to see what happens.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: CharleyO on March 08, 2006, 04:12:32 AM
***

I wish I had thought of this earlier and I do not remember reading this in previous posts. If i missed it, I am sorry.

I am now wondering if "somehow" the Common settings in Program Settings has been set to scan floppy disk, cd's, and other removable media when logging off? This might slow down the log-off process considerably.


***
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: fantomex on March 09, 2006, 12:57:49 AM
i guess it's related to this issue

http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19807.0
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 09, 2006, 03:26:55 AM
fantomex,

In fact I have a IBM/Lenovo pc... I'm gonna itry out installing avast again and doing the modification you sugested in the level of security.

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 10, 2006, 06:51:36 PM
Well... I've just reinstalled avast and exlude the IBM Access Updater xml file from the scan... I've rebooted the system just once until now, and it rebooted normaly (and the
vrdb icon and the avast icon are merged). Any abnormal operation that I notice I'll put  here.

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: CharleyO on March 10, 2006, 08:51:29 PM
***

Thanks for the update info, Juliano.    :)

Hopefully, that will help someone else with a similar problem.


***
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 10, 2006, 11:03:03 PM
fantomex,

I've excluded the "C:\Program Files\IBM\Updater\SYSRECO.XML" from the scaning process... the first time I reboot my system, everything worked fine... but the second time I rebooted my IBM, the annoying delay apear again.

Am I excluding the right file from the scaning process?

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: DavidR on March 10, 2006, 11:08:55 PM
Where did you exclude the file, Program Settings, Exclusions (which is for on-demand scans) or from the Standard Shield provider (which is what is involved in the scanning during boot) ?

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v325/for-dwr/sshield-exclusions.jpg)
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 10, 2006, 11:20:32 PM
At Programs Settings, Exclusions... sorry... I'm gonna try the correct setting.  :-[.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 11, 2006, 01:41:55 PM
I exclude the SYSRECO.XML from the scan process at the standard section as the picture shows... but didn't work.

Am I excluding the right file (in case of the IBM Access)?

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: DavidR on March 11, 2006, 03:36:18 PM
You have to provide either the full path to the file or use wild cards ' * ' as indicated in the image, example c:\*\sysreco.xml. In your original path 'C:\Program Files\IBM\Updater\' the Program Files part may not work because it it longer than 8 characters and has a space in it. Co you may need to enclose the complete path in "quotes" or use  C:\Progma~1\IBM\Updater\sysreco.xml or use wild cards.

I have no idea what file IBM Access uses (I haven't got that program), but surely you have identified the file which is being assessed.
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: igor on March 13, 2006, 12:58:12 AM
What exactly did you put into the list of exclusions?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 13, 2006, 01:10:32 AM
igor,

I put exactly

     C:\Arquivos de Programas\IBM\Updater\SYSRECO.XML

Where "Arquivos de Programas" means "Program Files" in an english based operating system. And it still doesn't work, even if I use wildcards (c:\*\sysreco.xml, for example).

    Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: Lisandro on March 13, 2006, 02:25:08 AM
jpavel, why don't you try:
C:\Arquiv~1\IBM\Updater\SYSRECO.XML
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: igor on March 13, 2006, 04:36:55 PM
C:\*\SYSRECO.XML should certainly work (and it's a short name, so there shouldn't be any long/short filename problem).

Are you sure it's the one causing the heavy scanning? I.e. if you put this mask into the list of exclusions and check the "Last scanned" item of the Standard Shield - is it really the matching file that keeps appearing there?
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: jpavel on March 13, 2006, 05:04:11 PM
Igor, I'm not sure if SYSRECO.XML is the one responsible for the heavy work... but it is the only one markup language file related to IBM tools I've found that was constantly changing. If fact, it's not even real big. Its about 300K.

About the last scanned file... it changes from time to time (I mean, as I can see when de system is rebooting or shutting down).

Juliano
Title: Re: Avast 4.6.763 incredible slows down my windows xp shutdown process
Post by: posbis on June 22, 2006, 12:00:39 PM
Ok, I've seen at avast site that there was an attempt to solve this problem at the 4.7.623 version. Ok... I installed avast 4.6.763 last week and everything was fine until 2 days ago, when the system becomes incredible slow to perform the shutdown (the "Windows is shutting down" screen in Windows XP home edition)... it started taking about 3 to 5 minutes to shutdown.

Well, after a lot of tests with some of the programs that were installed in my computer, I found that when I kill the ashserv.exe process, the system get back to normal shutdown delay.

Is there anything I'm missing? Is there anything I can do to solve this problem?

Juliano/Brazil

Have the same problem with Avast 4.7.xxxx

I have a complex setup in my home environment.
- Windows 2003 Active Directory Domain
- Roaming Profiles
- SmartCard Authentication
- ....

My Windows XP Workstation suffers from the same slow shutdown. When I read through this forum somebody mentioned an Event-Log entry saying that the user registry (ntuser.dat) cannot be unloaded.

That was the point when I remembered that I had the same problem in our enterprise network at our company. Lots of PCs (NT4, 2K, XP) had extremely long shutdown times.

The reason is because some buggy applications (not especially MS ones but some MS as well :-) do not close their registry handles correctly when logging off. Therefore the romaing profile (especially the ntuser.dat (= HKCU) cannot be unloaded and the system waits until these processes die before unloading the registry.

Interesting is that MS has no fix for this (is not so easy to handle this cleanly in coding) but some MS guy wrote a really cool workaround which works quiet good for such applications. It seems that the tool is kind of supported by MS and offered through the standard download channels.

We distributed it on all our company workstations and the result is really good.

So I installed it on my XP workstation and did a shutdown with ZoneAlarm and Avast fully loaded. The system went down smoothley and the message in the event log was gone. The tool is a service (uphclean.exe) and checks  the open handles to the registry on shutdown. If there are some it does some cleanup work by remapping or closing them and to free HKCU for unloading.

Give it a try.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=U&start=1&q=http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx%3Ffamilyid%3D1B286E6D-8912-4E18-B570-42470E2F3582%26displaylang%3Den&e=9797

or

Google for: uphclean (it is the first link)

Hope this helps for some of you as well.